


Black, No Cream

by kay_emm_gee



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Future Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-28
Updated: 2016-03-28
Packaged: 2018-05-29 14:27:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6379831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kay_emm_gee/pseuds/kay_emm_gee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Officially, Karen doesn’t have a favorite coffee shop. It would be too easily for people--cops, interns from the district attorney’s office, undergrads desperate for writing opportunities, that CEO she wrote an expose on--to find her. She supposes that is the cost of becoming a headlining writer at The Daily Bulletin and she would happily forfeit more if it meant she got to keep fighting corruption like this for the rest of her life.</p>
<p>Still, when she has the time and a low-fitting baseball cap, she slips into a back corner table of this tiny diner--Mary Ann’s it says in flickering neon red light--around the corner from her office. No one is the wiser. </p>
<p>Four months she makes it, and then the coffee cup arrives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Black, No Cream

**Author's Note:**

> just a little idea i had after watching the diner scene from 2x11

Officially, Karen doesn’t have a favorite coffee shop. It would be too easily for people--cops, interns from the district attorney’s office, undergrads desperate for writing opportunities, that Fortune 500 CEO she wrote an exposé on--to find her. She supposes that is the cost of becoming a headlining writer at The Daily Bulletin, and she would happily forfeit more if it meant she got to keep fighting corruption like this for the rest of her life.

Still, when she has the time and a low-fitting baseball cap, she slips into a back corner table of this tiny diner-- _Mary Ann’s_  the sign reads in flickering neon red light--around the corner from her office. With her hair up and hidden, and her head ducked as she scribbles out notes and ideas on a lined spiral pad, there is little chance of anyone spotting her. So she sips coffee with two creams and tucks her legs up on the ripped booth seat, grateful for her little place of peace and anonymity (she finds it ironic now that she ever felt alone in this city and now her name is printed above the fold on a weekly basis).

Four months she makes it, and then the coffee cup arrives.

“Oh, I thought I said I didn’t need another,” she says, smiling up at Carol, the waitress with the laugh lines and tired eyes.

“It’s on the house, actually,” Carol replies with a bitten-back grin.

Karen tenses, scanning the diner for whoever has found her, the whoever who undoubtedly wants something (a favor, a story, a chance to explain or avenge). She finds no one she recognizes, no one with a hungry or desperate or pissed expression on their face.

She grabs Carol’s arm before she turns away, murmuring, “Who sent it?”

“He’s right over--” she breaks off, confused. “There.”

Karen looks, feeling a little desperate herself, but still, there is no one.

“Huh,” Carol remarks. “He must’ve been a shy one. Don’t know why; he was a looker even with his big nose.”

Something clicks in Karen’s mind and she glances at the cup of steaming coffee. Black coffee.

Her mind flashes back to another diner, another time when her world was darker both outside and in. She recalls a broken man, a conversation about coffee, guns, bullshit, love, and death. She remembers a goodbye.

_Just stay away from me._

Her heartbeat picks up as she looks towards Carol, knowing her eyes are too wild for this quiet, warm spring afternoon. She starts to ask a question but pauses with lips parting, not even knowing what she wants--or needs--to ask. Her waitress looks at her with concern before hesitantly squeezing her shoulder.

“Never mind,” she says soothingly. “He ordered a whole pot for you but I’ll forget about it if he’s been bothering you or somethin--”

“No!” Karen blurts, her hands grabbing at the mug Carol was trying to take away. “No, no it’s fine. I’ll keep this one. It’s fine.”

Carol gives her one more tentative glance before retreating behind the counter. Karen lets her fingers dance around the rim of the mug, across the cracks and chips in the dull white ceramic. Steam still rises off the surface of the dark drink inside, a clear sign of its heat even if she hasn’t felt it directly yet.

(Just like _him_ ; she can feel his quiet but strong presence in the diner even if he left before she even got a glimpse of him).

As her fingers slide around the mug’s side through the handle, she gets her phone. She pulls up the article from Chicago, the one that had made her heart stop with its headline: _Punisher presumed dead after gang shootout._ There had been no body, which had been her only line of hope for his survival; there had been plenty of blood though, which had been too enormous a doubt of his possible demise for her to ignore.

The mug of black coffee is in her hand now though, in her hand and warm. It's not feeling Frank's hand in hers, alive and warm, but it is as close as they can get with the paths they have chosen. Although it may not be what she wants, it is enough for now. So with a small smile, Karen picks up the drink and sips at it, black no cream, bitter but comforting all the same, just like him.


End file.
